Guilt or Repentance

In Sunday School, someone posed the question "Do I live my life by guilt or by repentance?" How would I answer that question, how would each of us answer that question? One thing that I know has contributed to my struggles is the expectation I have of myself to be PERFECT! I am the first to admit that I am a perfectionist. I have always wanted to see myself as perfect and for others to see me as perfect. When I fall short of that goal, I beat myself up over it.

Over the past few months, I have discovered that I was trying my hardest to be perfect on my own. When I did make mistakes I felt huge guilt, even over the smallest things. I always have known I can turn to the savior for the BIG mistakes, you know the ones that everyone knows are really bad. However, on all the others, I have spent too much time beating myself up over those mistakes. In reality I was living "my life by guilt" NOT "by repentance". The past few months I have really learned the importance of turning to our Savior to repent. There is no need for me to spend my days feeling guilty about all my mistakes, large or small. Instead I should focus more on repenting and learning from my mistakes.